‘Hantu’ and Highway: Transport in Sabah 1881–1963

Abstract

Sabah (previously known as British North Borneo) occupies the whole of the northern portion of the island of Borneo, covering an area of 76, 115 square kilometres. Its immediate neighbours are Brunei, Sarawak and Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo). From 1882 to 1942, Sabah was administered by the British North Borneo (Chartered) Company. The territory possessed three main attractions: its timber, its reputed minerals and its land. Timber has now grown to be amajor export commodity, second only to petroleum. With the exception of deposits of coal and some gold, economic resources of other sought-after minerals were not proven during the period. The land proved to be the most valuable asset. Many crops were experimented with: tobacco, sugar cane, coffee, coconuts and rubber and they laid the basis for the economic development of the territory. The expansion of these crops was largely assisted by the introduction of a modern transport system which supplemented the original means of communication, the rivers. The railway in particular provided the impetus for the rubber boom on the west coast. In turn, this resulted in the emergence of an export-oriented economy, specializing in rubber, timber, copra and tobacco. From 1942, Sabah was occupied by the Japanese until its liberation in 1945. After a brief period under military administration, it became a British Colony in 1946. Under colonial rule from 1946 to 1963 the previous pattern of economic exploitation continued.

Dimming the Seas around Borneo: Contesting Island Sovereignty and Lighthouse Administration amidst the End of Empire, 1946–1948

“…With its external threats ostensibly nullified, and a veil of protection offered by the metropole, the North Borneo Company's administrators focused on extending colonial ideas of order and ‘civility’ across the territory's vast hinterlands. Networks of small bridle paths and eventually railways were gradually carved into the dense jungles (Kaur 1994: 8–9). By the turn of the twentieth century, North Borneo was on the peripheries of empire, and to colonials, seemingly far from the world's more pressing geopolitical threats.…”

Perkembangan Perkhidmatan Keretapi Di Sabah, 1881-1963: Satu Tinjauan

“…Pembinaan semula menyebabkan kos perbelanjaan meningkat kepada £800,000 pada tahun 1923. 35 Sungguhpun begitu, perkhidmatan keretapi di bawah pengurusan Cowie tidak menepati ciri-ciri binaan landasan yang baik. Landasan keretapi yang dibina juga daif di samping tidak memiliki infrastruktur yang lengkap.…”

“…Jasni 18 Selain digunakan sebagai medium perhubungan, sungai juga merupakan penentu perkembangan sosioekonomi di Sabah. 19 Antaranya, perkhidmatan pengangkutan sungai di Pansiangan. Kegiatan ekonomi di Pansiangan melibatkan aktiviti perniagaan penduduk antara daerah.…”

In situ off‐farm work in the transport industry among oil palm smallholders in Sabah: Negotiating the borders of licit and illegal activities

“…In Sabah, roads have historically been built to serve the export economies, especially rubber and timber when experiments with railways proved expensive in the early part of the twentieth century (Kaur, 1994). Today, they are viewed as key mechanisms for agricultural development, quality of life enhancement and for an important new industry, tourism (Liew Tsonis, personal communication, 2008).…”

“…Encouraged by these observations, this paper examines the unintended effects of roads by analysing the work of the informal transport sector in Eastern Sabah and the way in which it makes fluid the metaphoric border that exists between what are perceived to be licit and illegal activities that take place on roads. We evaluate the impact of rural roads not only in the usual sense of its effects on economic development (Kaur, 1994;Windle and Cramb, 1997), but also in terms of activities that take place 'beneath the statistics' as described by Tagliacozzo (2005). Specifically, we examine the flow of products (oil palm) and people, from the perspective of those who use the roads in a manner considered licit by local communities but illegal by the state, and which may not appear on state revenue or licensing records when they are scrutinised.…”